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Alaskan Adventure – Vancouver Rhode Island
And so, the preamble to this adventure came to a close. Sadly, our faithful machines were bagged tagged and chained together in a scary parking lot, awaiting our eventual return.
After removing my shoes in the name of safety at the soulless airport, I climb into the belly of the whale once again; insert the metal buckle into the fastener low and tight across my hips once again, and, what took three excellent days to achieve is undone in less than two hours. Our flight lands at LAX, where a four hour delay due to typically broken airplane equipment has us both on the verge of screaming, if only to be arrested and at least removed from the soulless airport. Air travel couldn’t be worse, more degrading, uncomfortable, ridiculous or horrible. I calculate time passage by the inane repeating announcement that begins, “the transportation security administration has decreed…” There are six announcements to the hour. We hear twenty-four before mercifully placed on a patched together aircraft and are finally transported to work.
Work is the usual blur of hotel, arena, bus, hotel. San Antonio became Corpus Christi became Laredo became San Antonio again. Sleep became a precious commodity. So did patience. TV shows blur by in that fast-slow manner that only television productions can. Four days hence, our pound of flesh is exacted, and we were released to relive the horrors of air travel once again.
It’s Not ALL Bad
Sleeping Beauty arrives safely in Seattle the night before Dark Meat and me. My beautiful girlfriend texts me the hotel I’d booked for her is ‘like heaven.’ I text her back to ‘not get too used to it.’
Happily reunited, and happily finished with air travel for the foreseeable future, our merry band of adventurers is finally mounted up and finally on the Road to Alaska.
Captain Bill – The Best!
After lunch with an old friend in Port Angeles, we board the ferry for Vancouver Island. Ninety pleasant minutes later, we’re transported across the ocean and to another world.
Canadian Customs and Immigration is strange. The agents are polite, yet firm. During ferry deboating, Abi and I get separated. The last time I cleared Customs with Fiona, we were waved out of line and sent into the office,which is the Customs and Immigration version of the penalty box. The reason we were pulled in? Fiona had never been to Canada before. The Customs agent deemed her Canadian-virgin status highly suspicious, and every manner of background check was run on poor Sleeping Beauty. Forty-five boring minutes later, she was de-virginized, and allowed into the beautiful land of Kanuckistan.
The Customs agent that greets us is bored. He asks us a few perfunctory questions, barely glances at our passports, then dismisses us with a half-wave. I’m confused; do we have to go to the penalty box? I decide if that’s what his half-wave meant, he’ll let us know, but until then, I am getting the hell out of Customs! We pull out to the main street of Victoria to wait for Abi.
And we wait.
And wait.
And wait some more.
Forty-five minutes pass. Sleeping Beauty gets curious and walks over to see what the holdup is. She spies Abi, arms folded, standing far away from his motorcycle as two customs agents tear through every single item in his possession. Bags are ripped open, dirty clothes and junk are spread about, both agents intent on finding something suspicious.
This, unfortunately, is the downside to traveling with a terrorist lookalike.
An hour and a half later, he’s released and finally rolls up to us, shaking his head.
“What happened?”
“When I gave them my passport, the agent demanded a second form of identification. She took all of my ID, went into the office, and came back about two minutes later, looking pissed. She told me they ran a customary test on my license and detected traces of cocaine! They made me pull over, and opened everything up. I even had to take the fucking seat off my bike!”
Wait a minute. Cocaine? Jeez, you think you know a person and all the while, right under your nose, they’re a crackhead! Unbelievable the things you learn on a long motorcycle trip!
Actually, I have to say that I’ve known Dark Meat Snack for half my life, and honestly, the kid can barely finish a beer. And besides that, from what I know of it, cocaine is expensive, and Abi is definitely a… spendthrift. There is no way there were traces of cocaine on his license, unless the TSA agent that checked it in San Antonio was also a junkie.
After that rude introduction to Vancouver Island, we drown our sorrows at a great little Irish Pub. Pretty soon, pints of Guinness work their magic; we’re all laughing over the incident, and trying to figure out where Dark Meat hid his drugs. I guess the stash is in his little red gas can. He tells me I don’t want to know where they are hidden.
The next morning we are just about loaded up when a hotel worker approaches. After the usual round of, ‘Gosh! Did you ride those things all the way here?’ ends, he recommends we go see a stand of gigantic trees that are, in his words, “mighty impressive!” Tracing the route to the trees on my map he exclaims, “They’re huge! Twenty people can join hands around them! These trees have been there since Jesus planted them!”
Circling the Jesus trees on the map, I thank the man, and we aim our bikes in that direction.
The ride from Victoria to Port Hardy happens in two parts. The first part is great – that is, if you enjoy row after row of used RV lots, Wal-marts and strip malls. I flip my iPod over to the ‘Angry White Man Music’ playlist and muddle through the suburbs as quickly as possible. The Jesus trees are impressive, and a worthwhile detour.
The second part of the ride sucks, unless you enjoy winding open roads, little to no traffic, zero police supervision, spectacular mountain vistas and occasional curious wildlife. Thanks to the decided lack of Mounties on the northern half of Vancouver Island, we make up plenty of time on the way to Port Hardy.
Finally, I find the well hidden ‘Welcome to…’ sign, and happily claim Vancouver Island for the Kingdom of Rhode Island. Welcome to Vancouver Rhode Island!
As we wind our way to the end of the road, there are huge swaths of mountain that have been clear cut of all trees. I think to myself these mountains look like freshly shorn sheep, and while it might be a shame the trees are gone, there are signs explaining their replanting efforts, and besides all that, someday I want to own a log cabin.
While I think these inane thoughts, a newly appointed resident of the Kingdom of Vancouver Rhode Island pokes his head up to say hello.
Frenchy the Bear
There are also other wondrous sights to behold in the north parts of Vancouver Rhode Island.
In Port Hardy, we dine in the height of luxury. Subway foot-longs, Baked Lays and medium American Champagnes – Coca-Cola. Awesome.
While choking down this ‘meal’, we’re treated to some authentic Port Hardy dinner theater, as a policeman in the parking lot arrests a town drunk. After dinner, Dark Meat fades away to check in with the wife (that’s going to take me a while to get used to saying) while Fiona and I pop into a pub for a nightcap. The five-thirty port call for the ferry to take us to Prince Rupert is fast-approaching, and while we enjoy the cute bartender’s tales of life in a small town, we soon fade away as well, content with thoughts of better days and better roads – as always – swirling in my tiny little brain.
Author: frenchy
3 Responses to “Alaskan Adventure – Vancouver Rhode Island”
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Hay buddy… it seems your enjoying the trip up north. great photos.. but how many times have I told you to leave the taliban at home. I was under the impression that the canadians like our hippy, war dodging, drug addicts. I am sure they were just looking to the coke in the little brown mans bags so they could have a line… cheers.. dan
Uhhhhhh……updates PLEASE!!!!!!! You just leave us hangin’ at the beginning of the good part????? Or did a friendly Alaskan moose make Abi his bitch?!?!?!
Frenchy,
Thanks for the inclusion in this chapter of the “Alaskan Adventure”. It was great to see you and Abi and finally meet Fiona… You sure she doesn’t have a sister??!! Sorry to hear about Abi’s delay and ordeal at the border… He should change his Driver’s License picture from the one with the beard, dark glasses, and AK-47 to something a little more current…!?
Me and three friends had a similar experience at a Belgian/French Border Crossing while on our way to England in a VW Minibus in 1974. We must have fit the profile of young American Tourists seeing Europe who were suspected of financing their trip by smuggeling drugs from one country to the next. They were convinced we had at least a couple of keys of Hash stashed somewhere in the bus, but were not able to find so much as a trace of anything, which of course made them that much more un-happy with us. Three and a half hours later, after threatening me with a drug sniffing dog(which ended up being a bluff) they reluctantly gave back our passports and sent us on our way… We eventually got to England later that night, where the warm English beer flowed in celebration…and a victory pipe was passed…!
Glad to hear the second half of the run up-Island was at least a little more scenic. With any luck the trip along the Inside Passage was uneventful the weather was good and you got caught up on your sleep. Looks like your taking a long lunch in Terrace this afternoon… or some Mountie got a look at Abi’s Driver’s License picture… In any case continued safe travels and again it was great to spend some time with you here in PA!
Capt’n Bill